The fasting lasted for ten days and then the snake hunt began. For four days the hunters - members of the Hopi Snake Order and one white man - gathered snakes, mostly rattlers, from the four cardinal directions. When they returned they took one more day to prepare themselves, and then they were ready to perform the sacred Snake Dance. Under the blazing desert sun the white man painted himself with clay and tossed snakes back and forth with members of the Snake and Antelope fraternities. Most of the spectators would never have imagined that one of the dancers was the photographer Edward Curtis.
Edward Curtis, one of the best known and most prolific photographers of Native Americans, played a major role in shaping the view of Indians as "noble savages," members of a vanishing race. For more than a quarter of a century, beginning shortly after 1900, Curtis engaged in a Herculean effort to make "a comprehensive and permanent record of all the important tribes in the United States that still retain to a considerable degree their primitive traditions and customs." During this period, Curtis took more than 40,000 photographs, collected more than 350 traditional Indian tales, produced a full-length fea ture film, and made more than 10,000 sound record ings of Indian speeches and music.
The published result was a masterwork-The North American Indian-20 volumes of text, including more than 1,500 full-page illustrations, accompanied by 20 portfolios containing more than 700 copperplate photogravures. Curtis's work is both a brilliant achievement of artistic photography and a revealing look into how art may both reflect and shape public opinion.
Curtis received valuable help in the course of his monumental endeavor, including at least two occa sions when fate tapped him on the shoulder. In 1898,while climbing Mt. Rainier, he rescued a group of hikers that included C. Hart Merriam, George Bird Grinnell, and Gifford Pinchot. These distinguished scientists and writers later provided him with invalu able contacts and assistance. In 1904 President Theodore Roosevelt saw Curtis's work in a magazine and asked him to make a portrait of his children.Roosevelt provided Curtis with a letter of introduc tion that gave him access to many helpful people,including Curtis's primary financial backer, J.P.Morgan. However, despite Morgan's assistance, the need constantly to scramble for funds plagued Curtis throughout the life of his project. When the final volume came out, in 1930, his health, marriage, and finances had all been ruined.
Curtis never published another book after 1930,and rarely spoke again of The North American Indian.He spent the rest of his life wandering, mining for gold and, in his final years, farming. Edward Curtis died in 1952, an enigma, perhaps a genius, and one of the most interesting and controversial photogra phers of the twentieth century.